


The Line(r)

by superyuui



Category: Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicle
Genre: Alcohol, Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern with Magic, Cruise Ships, HP references: 2, Illegal Activities, KuroFai Olympics, M/M, Magic, On the Run, Partial Mind Control, Roommates, Telepathy, author’s shame: 0, bad philosophy jokes: 1, brief dubcon kissing, couples' cruise
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-20
Updated: 2019-08-20
Packaged: 2020-09-18 18:49:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 16,708
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20317786
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/superyuui/pseuds/superyuui
Summary: Magic is illegal, as Fai has known his whole life. It's a technicality; one of those esoteric laws that never got updated or repealed - until it isn't. People are going missing, and the only thing Fai can do is go on the run - it's just convenient that his gorgeous roommate makes the perfect protection.If only they had chosen to go by land.[Team Sea] (Prompt: Roommates) KuroFai Olympics 2019





	1. The Embarkment

“Stay close, and let me do the talking.”

“'Let you do the talking'?” Fai echoed under his breath, taking Kurogane by the wrist, “you're sure that’s wise?”

Kurogane reconsidered.

“Just stay close, then. Try and look less guilty."

Easier said than done.

The queue shuffled along. Around them, people chatted away loudly and carelessly. Seagulls circled overhead, occasionally eclipsing the glowing sun. Fai pushed his sunglasses further up his nose and ignored the urge to look back over his shoulder. Kurogane's arm felt tense in his grasp.

"This is taking too long," he whispered.

Kurogane turned his head, eyed Fai around his own pair of sunglasses.

"Don't," Kurogane warned lowly.

"I'm not going to _do_ anything," Fai replied, "can't I make a simple comment-"

The couple in the queue in front of them finished at the arrivals desk, and Fai cut himself off mid sentence. Kurogane was handling the tickets, and so Fai finally gave in to temptation, and glanced back over his shoulder.

The pier was full of the other people queuing up for the ship, all of them dressed for their holidays. Away from the pier was the stone boardwalk, full to the railings with the crowds going about their business. Some were there to see off the family members that were boarding the ship, some were their on their own holidays, and some were probably just trying to get to work. None of them seemed to be paying him any mind, which was good.

The sales rep's handheld scanner made an angry noise.

"Oh," she said in surprise, and scanned the barcode again. The angry noise repeated itself. "I'm sorry,"

"Is there a problem?"

"It's saying the ticket is invalid," the sales rep replied absently as she paused to wipe the scanner's lens with a cloth. She scanned the tickets once more, and once more the noise sounded. "I'm very sorry, sirs, but-"

Fai dropped Kurogane’s wrist, and shuffled to the side.

"Can you try it again?" Fai asked, leaning against the desk. The sales rep sighed loudly, and tried it a third time.

"Oh, there we go," she said, as the indicator light turned green, "must've been something wrong with the scanner." She explained the layout of the ship, giving them a leaflet with a map, and their room keys. Kurogane grabbed Fai's hand a little too tightly as they walked the gangplank.

"That hurts, Kuro-tan," Fai griped, once they had gotten out of earshot. He tried to flex his fingers, but Kurogane had him held fast.

"That was reckless," hissed Kurogane.

"We're on the boat, aren't we?"

Kurogane stopped, and turned to face Fai where he had fallen a few steps behind. He looked about one engorged forehead vein away from a full-blown aneurysm, and the muscle in his jaw was visibly clenching and unclenching. Fai lifted his chin, and stared Kurogane in the eye.

After a few moments, voices floated up to them from the bottom of the embarkment tunnel. Kurogane span back around, and continued leading Fai into the bowels of the ship.

"Where's our room?" Fai asked, at a normal volume.

"The person on the desk told us," Kurogane replied shortly, pausing at a junction in the hallways for just a few seconds before continuing. Eventually, the voices of the other passengers grew quiet behind them. Fai tried to loosen his hand, but Kurogane just held tighter.

"I'm not going to do anything," repeated Fai, rolling his eyes, "your hand is sweaty."

"Deal with it; we aren't far away enough, yet."

Fai huffed. "Nobody's there, not on the ship and not on the dock. I looked."

"I'm not taking any more chances. You're sticking with me until I say it's clear."

The hallways continued on like a plush, shiny labyrinth. Fai had no idea how Kurogane managed to navigate at all, much less actually find their room, but it wasn't much longer before they were swiping the keycard in the door handle. Kurogane opened the door, and Fai walked straight into his back. He had set one foot in the room and immediately stopped dead in his tracks.

"What the hell?"

Fai used the momentary distraction to yank his hand free, which went almost unnoticed. He followed Kurogane all the way into the room, shaking his fingers out as he went, and shutting the door behind him.

"What's the problem?"

Kurogane gestured incredulously. Fai could not see anything out of place; the carpet was soft and clean, the sheets on the bed were crisp and neatly tucked. The wardrobe didn't have a door, but it did have many spare hangers on which to hang their clothes, as well as what looked like spare bedding. The door to the ensuite bathroom was ajar, the TV remote was next to the tiny 3-cup kettle, and Kurogane was still gesturing.

"There's one bed."

"Yep, that's definitely the number of beds in the room," Fai said, trying to keep the tone light and getting a withering look in return for his trouble. Kurogane reiterated that he wasn't really asking if there was one bed, but actually why there were not any more beds.

"I expect it would be a bit odd to have separate beds on a couples' cruise, Kuro-rin," replied Fai, as he ambled over to the window.

"A couples'-" Kurogane sputtered, and held his hand out for the leaflets the sales rep had passed to Fai. Fai passed them over, knowing from his own cursory glance earlier that they said “couples’ cruise package” in big metallic lettering on the front, and also knowing that there was no way Kurogane would believe it unless he saw it for himself.

“You didn’t say this cruise was for couples!”

“You didn’t ask,” Fai replied blithely. Perhaps he was enjoying this a bit too much.

Kurogane opened his mouth, about to yell at Fai some more, when he seemed to reconsider, and closed it again. He then also closed his eyes for a count of ten, after which he stomped across the room and threw open the bulging suitcase they had brought.

Fai sat down heavily on the bed, and flopped back onto the pillows. Faintly, he could hear noises coming from the neighbouring cabins; a loud television show on one side, voices on the other, and footsteps from above. In the hallway, someone else passed by, their suitcases rolling along the floor from left to right, and disappearing again. It had an oddly communal feeling to it, like being rammed into tiny rooms in a high-rise building.

“Almost reminds you of uni, doesn’t it?” Fai mused aloud. Kurogane paused rooting around in their things for a moment.

“Less of a weed smell,” he said finally, and Fai snorted.

“Give it time, Kuro-pippi. We’ve not even set sail yet.”


	2. The Liner

_Eighteen months ago._

Kurogane's new roommate was already there when he arrived, his arms full with bags and boxes. The first thing that struck him was how light his hair was - almost unnaturally so, Kurogane felt. His roommate was chattering away on the phone (that's what it seemed like, anyway. Kurogane wouldn't have understood what was being said even if he did make an effort to eavesdrop). Inwardly, Kurogane groaned, and outwardly, Kurogane rolled his eyes.

The door swung shut behind him, heavily enough that the wall rattled. The roommate jumped and looked over his shoulder, blue eyes widening at the sight of Kurogane stood in the doorway. Kurogane thought he was going to say something, but the roommate turned back around and continued to rummage in his own things, still speaking on his phone.

Well, whatever.

There was barely enough space on the desk on Kurogane's side for him to drop all of his things, and there was still more stuff to collect from the car. This was going to take ages, and it didn't even look like there was enough storage space in the room. Kurogane hissed through his teeth and went to fetch more luggage.

“Are you going to be much longer?” his sister asked, evidently bored with waiting, but not so bored as to actually offer a hand moving his stuff. “Sakura’s waiting for me.”

“I’d be done faster if I had some help,” Kurogane replied pointedly, hefting more boxes into his arms. Tomoyo tucked her hair back over her shoulders and smiled sweetly.

“Double yellows,” she said apologetically, without actually looking apologetic. Kurogane rolled his eyes skyward, and shut the boot lid.

“I’m done. Be good,” he shifted his armload so that he could point a warning finger at her. “If there’s so much as a scratch on this car-”

“I know, I know,” she interrupted with an eye-roll of her own, the bite of it softened with a grin. “Strung up by my ears.”

Kurogane watched until the car turned off at the end of the road, rebalanced his things in his arms, and re-entered his new home.

By the time he got back upstairs, his roommate was gone again.

-

Kurogane was certain he'd been assigned the flakiest roommate in all of existence.

When the blonde had finally introduced himself ("My name's really long, you can just call me Fai. Oh, your name's really long too, can I call you-" "No."), he had jerked away from Kurogane's handshake as if he'd been zapped. Since then, Fai had gone out of his way - quite literally - to avoid touching Kurogane again, which was fine, if not a bit odd.

So far, they'd been rooming together for a week, and in that time there had been no end of weird conversations.

"Do you believe in magic?" Fai had asked, the first afternoon after classes started.

"No." Kurogane had said, immediately, not even looking up from his phone.

"No, of course. Why would you, right?" Fai said hurriedly, laughing, before he disappeared for the rest of the evening. This arrangement was fine with Kurogane - he had the distinct impression that the less time he spent around the blonde, the better.

Except, the conversations kept being weird. And Fai just didn't seem to get the hint.

"Say you _did_ believe in magic-" he had started.

"Except I don't," Kurogane had interrupted, already developing an exposure headache, "I don't believe in things that I can't see."

Fai had snorted derisively at that, and it hadn't been particularly attractive on him. Not that Kurogane had been noticing whether or not Fai was attractive, or-

"Well, of course you can't see it," Fai had said. The way he had said it was strange, and sounded as if he thought it was Kurogane's fault that he couldn't see something that wasn't real, "by that logic, do you not believe in air?"

"Don't be pedantic."

"I'm not being pedantic; you're the one who said it. Do you not believe in magnets, either?"

That time, Kurogane had been the one to leave for the evening.

* * *

_3 hours after embarking._

It was a nice ship, if ships were your sort of thing.

It was huge, and had been gleaming white, once upon a time. There were at least ten decks, with capacity for over 3,000 guests and staff. It featured five dining rooms and three ballrooms, as well as a spa, a cinema, a fitness suite, a library, and even a bowling alley (not that bowling was always a good idea while at sea). The staff were pleasant, if not overbearing, and the food was actually quite decent, even on cheaper fares.

The boat had always been a cruise liner, and for some reason, had always been particularly successful when compared even to similar ships in the fleet. Marriage proposals always went over well, couples who had previously had rather rocky relationships briefly found their troubles would abate, and couples who had been together longer than they had been apart found that their love rekindled.

Until a few years ago, anyway. Nowadays, cruises were less popular because of cheap airfare costs - why ride around the same group of ports that you already live near to, when you can fly anywhere in the world in less time?

If the ship felt bad about the lack of business, we wouldn't know. Though they are marvels of machinery, ships are inanimate, of course.

Ships weren't Fai's sort of thing, anyway.

-

Later that evening, Fai burst back through the door of their room, carefully balancing a number of plates on the tray in his hands. It had been truly ages since he'd had a decent pastry, and he had not been above abusing the 'meals included' clause of their fare - whether or not pastries were good dinner food was irrelevant to him.

"I got about five different kinds of danish, and a plain roll for you." he said, once Kurogane had noticed him and fixed him with a look that was a shade or two darker than Annoyed. "They pre-buttered it for some reason but you can probably scrape it off."

"I thought we were going to stay put, for now."

"Good idea; we starve ourselves and die before getting caught." Fai tapped his brow with an index finger, "smart."

Kurogane didn't rise to the bait, unfortunately. He had really built up his resistance to Fai's teasing since they had met. It didn't stop it being fun, though.

"What if someone saw you?" He persisted.

"We're ages away from the harbour; practically in the middle of the ocean already." Fai purposefully neglected to mention that he'd already had an extended conversation with an elderly lady who had been at the salad bar. Fai had helped her reach things at the back of the display, and in return she had complimented his 'lovely blue eyes'.

"Couples' cruises don't cross the ocean, idiot."

It had been sort of nice, Fai had mused, to talk to another person who didn't resort to calling him 'idiot' every ten minutes.

"This one does," Fai said with a shrug, picking his pastry apart and eating it in layers. "Says so in the leaflet."

Kurogane consulted the leaflet again. He really ought to just read the whole thing in one go and properly familiarise himself, but Fai suspected he found it more interesting to find out the details of the voyage bit by bit, like it was a large picture loading on dial-up. What else would Kurogane vent his pent-up anger on, if he couldn't get surprised about the details of their 'getaway'? It wasn't healthy, but Fai wasn't his counsellor.

"What the hell kind of cruise is this," Kurogane muttered incredulously under his breath, his brows furrowed.

“The kind we run away on,” Fai said, shrugged, and started on the second pastry, which he folded, and ate like a calzone. Kurogane, in response, turned so that Fai was completely out of his line of sight, and Fai found it hard to chew while he was grinning smugly to himself.

After that, Kurogane was quiet through the rest of their "dinner", giving the bed a thousand-yard stare. It was almost odd - Fai didn't think he had ever seen Kurogane look so absent.

Definitely couldn't have that.

Fai sidled up to Kurogane, and bumped their shoulders together.

"Don't think so hard; you'll burn something,"

Kurogane focused on him then, his eyes dark in the light fading through the porthole. His renewed proximity was setting off a now-familiar prickling under Fai's skin. Kurogane's eyes bore into his and Fai held his stare, the knowledge of what it was that Kurogane was really looking at forefront in his mind. Kurogane's mouth was a tight, thin line. Fai swallowed.

"You're really alright with this?" Kurogane asked quietly, and Fai jerked his gaze back up.

"What?" he asked, dumbly. Kurogane nodded across the room.

"One bed. You'll be exhausted."

Fai grinned slyly, "Kuro-sama, you've not even taken me on a date, and now you're saying such provocative things-"

"Oh, shut up before I wring your neck," Kurogane interrupted with lacklustre, tiredly shoving Fai away, "you know what I mean."

Fai tittered.

"I'm sure it'll be fine," Fai said, "I'll lie on one side, and you'll lie on the other. It's not like we're going to be cuddling, is it?"

Kurogane folded his arms across his chest, gruffly confirming Fai's statement.

"And besides," Fai went on to continue, "it can only help, right? Make me less detectable."

Kurogane stared out of the window. His eyebrows were furrowed, but not really much more than they were usually. Fai suspected he'd be an early bloomer on the worry lines front.

"It bothers me," Kurogane admitted eventually, "I don't like it. If something happens-" Fai opened his mouth to interrupt, and Kurogane ploughed on, raising his voice, "if something happens, I don't like the idea of you not being able to get away."

Fai snorted, "If something happens, we'll be in the middle of the ocean," he said, a wry twist to his voice, "we'd be screwed, regardless of whether I have my magic. We probably ought to have thought our getaway through more thoroughly."

"We didn't have the time," Kurogane reminded him, somewhat absently. Fai nodded in agreement, suspecting that they would not have had much choice in how they'd ended up, even if they had had more time to plan. They were stuck on the vessel for the next week at least, and part of Fai worried he'd go utterly spare with boredom. He grabbed for the leaflet.

"Ooh!" Fai cooed, delighted, "they've got pottery classes!"

"You cannot be serious."

"Why not? I know you'd prefer to spend a whole week cooped up in this cabin, Kuro-pip, but it's not going to be a good idea."

"I'm sure you'll survive."

"Oh, I know I'll be alright," Fai said slyly, "it's you that I'm worried about."


	3. The Love

_Sixteen months ago._

"Why do you care so much if I believe in magic?" Kurogane had demanded one night, weeks into the school year. He may have had a few shots with the rest of the floor before attempting to retire to bed, before this conversation had even started.

Fai, who had had more than Kurogane had had, and didn't even look vaguely dented by it all, had taken it upon himself to retrieve Kurogane and convince him to further imbibe. The question popped into Kurogane's mind and rooted there like a ferocious weed, and all attempts to kill it before it grew and bore fruit had failed. Truthfully, Kurogane didn't even know what he would do with the answer. Even so, he persisted.

"You're always going on about it, so why?"

"Just, curiosity, I guess," Fai said, shrugging in such a blithe way that it immediately infuriated Kurogane. “Don’t worry about it, Kuro-sama.”

“It’s Kurogane,” Kurogane retorted, now out of habit more than anything. Fai had insisted on the stupid nicknames, almost as much as Kurogane insisted that he call him by his real name, and it was starting to really get on his nerves. It was sort of like a pointless dance, an endless to-ing and fro-ing that made Kurogane nauseous. “You spend weeks, weeks, and weeks and days, trying to talk to me about magic-” he might be a bit drunk, actually, which would also explain the nausea, “- and as soon as I want to talk about it, you clam up?”

"Something like that," Fai said, pulling Kurogane up by his arm. "Now, come and help me finish off my rum before the loud one from flat 6 gets there first."

More rum was probably not a good idea, given Kurogane’s state, but if it was free then he wasn’t about to decline. The flat was rammed full with people, more than had been there when Kurogane had left, and weaselling it so that Fai drank more than he did was easily done with the blonde being called back and forth between different conversations. If Fai really had noticed that his (borrowed, probably) NASA mug kept refilling when Kurogane’s didn’t, well, that wasn’t Kurogane’s fault.

Somehow, the flat proceeded to get more crowded. Kurogane saw someone he was sure was from a few floors below theirs.

“It’s a free country, Kuro-tan!” Fai shouted in his ear, above the music - when had the music started? - when Kurogane had complained to him about it. Fai then said something which Kurogane missed entirely in the din. He tried again, and Kurogane could only shrug. Fai looked around and, seeming to come to a decision, led Kurogane away with the hand he still had curled inside Kurogane’s elbow. Had he not let go at all?

Cool night air hit him in the face with a rush. Fai had pulled him out into one of the open walkways that served as the corridor for their building. The layout gave it the feel of a large block of council flats, or an even larger motel, but for tonight the easy outside access was a blessing. The sobering affect it had on Kurogane was almost tangible, and it was nice that things had stopped swaying so much.

Fai was looking at him like he’d said something, again, so Kurogane grunted.

“I asked if you’re feeling better,” Fai said, an amused grin on his pretty face. He really did have a pretty face… Kurogane shook himself.

“Yeah. Thanks.”

Fai patted his shoulder, once, and then leaned against the railing, looking out across the city. It was never truly dark, where they lived, the middle distance full of LED billboards and streetlights and traffic. Stars were invisible in the navy blue sky above them, and when Kurogane exhaled in a long huff, his breath condensed in front of him. It was probably colder than what he was feeling, the alcohol numbing his senses just enough that he still felt comfortable. Having Fai’s arm pressed against his from elbow to shoulder helped that, too.

“I don’t even know half of the people I talked to in there,” Fai said, breaking the silence after what could have been seconds or minutes. Time was slipping away from Kurogane like rising mist, and he was content to just drift. Part of him was aware that he would have a hell of a hangover come the morning, and the other part was telling the first part to shut up and relax for once. “They seemed to know who I was, though.”

“You’re something of a celebrity,” Kurogane said, before the molasses of his brain decided it was probably best kept to himself. Fai perked up beside him.

“Really? How so?”

“Mm-mm,” Kurogane said. He shrugged a shoulder, jostling Fai a little bit in the process. “I’ve just heard things, that’s all.”

“Things?” Fai prodded. He looked far too pleased with himself.

“A girl in my morning lecture won’t shut up about you,” neither would Kurogane, apparently. “Something about your eyes, or your hair. Something. She said- she said. She said you helped her with her things, when her bag split in the lift. She said she looked into your blue eyes’n fell…” Kurogane squinted at Fai’s face. “Your eyes aren’t blue.”

Fai’s mouth worked wordlessly. He diverted his eyes - his grey eyes - away, and shifted so that their arms lost contact. Kurogane immediately missed the warmth.

“I’ll have to let her down gently,” Fai said, his voice low and soft. Kurogane went to say something more, suddenly feeling drunk again.

Below them, in the street, a woman shrieked. Kurogane and Fai, along with the other people loitering outside the flat, craned their heads over the railings to look down.

A woman was cornered against their building, two uniformed police officers in front of her, holding what looked like-

“Christ!” Someone to Kurogane’s left exclaimed in a loud whisper. “Are those guns?!”

Someone else hushed her, and they all continued to watch in transfixed horror. The music inside the flat shut off, and they could hear raised voices from the police officers.

“What are they saying?”

“I don’t know, I can’t hear- are you filming this?”

“Aren’t you?”

“Quiet!”

The woman in the street lifted her hands in surrender, but the police officers' voices raised further. They were still too high up to make any sense of what was being said, or maybe it was just the sloshing in Kurogane’s skull that was making it hard to understand them.

“Are they gonna shoot her?”

Fai pushed away from the railing abruptly, and started to head in the direction of the stairs. Kurogane snatched out and grabbed Fai by the sleeve.

“What are you doing?” Kurogane hissed when Fai whirled back around. The fluorescent security light above them was casting him in a pallid light, and he looked sick.

“I have to help her.”

“You have to- what?”

Fai tried squirming out of Kurogane’s grip, but even drunk, Kurogane had strength in spades.

“Kurogane-”

“Oh, God,” someone said with a gasp. Kurogane looked over the edge again just in time to see the officers bundling the woman into the back of their police car. After a few moments, the police joined her, and after a few more moments, drove away. Hushed silence fell over the gathered people on the landing - which was now crowded, Kurogane noticed, full of partygoers who had undoubtedly come out to see what the commotion was.

“Wonder what all that was about.”

The others on the landing started to chatter amongst themselves. Beside him, his arm still in Kurogane’s fist, Fai remained tense and transfixed on the street below, as if the altercation was still ongoing. He loosened his grip, and Fai snatched his arm back, escaping before Kurogane could even ask if he was okay.

* * *

_Twenty-four hours after embarking._

"So, how did you two meet?" Asked the elderly woman to Fai's right.

There were about eleven of them - five couples, plus the instructor - crammed into a tiny room within the maze of the middle deck. It was somehow alternating between chokingly stuffy and chillingly draughty in there, and Fai kept having to shrug off his hoodie just to put it back on again after a few minutes. Kurogane was on Fai's left, scowling hard enough that nobody dared approach him for conversation, unwittingly leaving Fai to talk for the two of them.

"We were roommates at uni," Fai said cheerily, trying to find less enjoyment in his friend's discomfort. He wasn't trying very hard.

"Oh, that's lovely," the woman said, her wrinkled fingers deftly shaping the lump of clay in front of her into a small dish. Fai's work in progress still just looked like a lump of clay. "I imagine you couldn't help yourself, him having muscles like that!" she added in a tone that she must have thought was low and conspiratorial, but in reality was probably loud enough to be recognisable from the corridor. Kurogane physically twitched beside Fai, who smothered the urge to burst into peals of laughter.

"Of course, how could I resist?" Fai stage-whispered, playing along.

"I bet he's good in the sack, too."

_"Don't you dare answer that,"_ Kurogane hissed. He had been in an awful mood all morning, which was a shame, because Fai had never slept better. Kurogane was already up and showered by the time Fai rolled free of the bedcovers, his hair sticking up all over the place and a line of dry saliva across his cheek.

"You drooled on my shoulder," Kurogane had complained while Fai tried to unstick his eyelids, unused to actually getting up before noon, and then hadn't said much of anything else since.

Not that Kurogane had ever been what Fai would call a chatterbox, but it was still sort of unsettling. Perhaps the stress was getting to him.

The lady turned her head, evidently having heard him, her wicked grin every bit the match of Fai's. Then she caught his face.

"You're the young man that helped Harold and I yesterday evening!" she exclaimed, "Harold, look, it's the young man from the dinner hall!"

"Huh?" Harold grunted.

"We were ever so grateful, young man. What's your name?"

"Fai," Fai answered, without really thinking. Kurogane kicked his ankle under the table, but it was already too late.

"I'm-," she started, trailing off, "say, didn't you have blue eyes?"

Fai's voice died in his throat.

"Uh,"

The lady continued to consider him thoughtfully. Fai stared back at her, trying to think of something, anything, to say- and then she shrugged. "Must've been a trick of the light!"

"Yeah," Fai laughed, his nerves brittle, "must've been."

"Fancy that," she mused. "Where was I? Oh, of course. Harold and I met on a cruise just like this, oh, it must've been forty years ago now, and we've been together ever since," she said it with a faraway look in her eyes, before settling back on Fai once more. "You can find love easily, on these old boats."

The lady continued to talk to him through the session, but Fai wasn't in much of a talking mood after that, and Kurogane remained a stoic picture of silence beside him. It took at least ten minutes for the hair on the back of Fai's neck to relax, and his attempt at a little clay bowl never quite recovered.

"You can say I told you so," Fai said, later, when they were queueing up for lunch. Kurogane shrugged in response.

"I don't know what you expected to happen," he grumbled. "You skip around, treating this like it's a game. We're not here for fun, Fai."

"I know that we're not here for fun," Fai said, once their lunches were in hand, lengthening his strides to keep up with Kurogane. "But wouldn't it stand out more if we stayed in the cabin all day?"

Kurogane didn't answer immediately, and Fai considered it a point in his court. Or the ball had landed. Or whatever.

Fai had hoped that they would be eating in the dining hall with the other holidaymakers, but instead, Kurogane led them back to the room again. They ate in silence, both sat on the shared bed, Fai sat by the pillows with his back on the wall, and Kurogane at the foot of the bed with his back to Fai. Fai couldn't see his face, but from the look of him, Kurogane was as stressed as a horse in a field full of plastic bags.

"You know what you need?" Fai blurted out once they had finished eating, and after the continued silence started to threaten Fai's very wellbeing. Kurogane gave a deep sigh and turned to regard Fai coolly.

"The touch of my Magic Fingers," Fai said, wildly suggestively, and waggling said fingers. Kurogane looked mildly horrified, until Fai explained that he looked tense and could probably do with a massage. Truthfully, Fai wasn't entirely sure what he was doing, he just couldn't bear the silent treatment for much longer.

Somewhat reluctantly, and after a fair amount of nagging because Fai truly was bored, Kurogane acquiesced, and sat back around on the bed. Fai sidled up behind him, and unable to resist the opportunity, made a noise like he was going to spit in his hands. Kurogane whipped his head around immediately, in a motion that would make most fitness instructors wince, and Fai burst into laughter.

"Sorry, I couldn't resist. Turn back around."

"Not if you're going to spit on me." Kurogane grumbled, and turned anyway. Fai's hands settled onto Kurogane's muscled shoulders. They truly did feel as tense as they looked - that, or the hardness of those muscles was down to the fact that Kurogane was built like-

"I won't spit on you," Fai said quickly. "Scout's Honour."

Kurogane snorted in amusement, the motion travelling through Fai's hands.

"As if you were ever in the Scouts."

"Hm, not the Scouts, I guess, but I was a Cub."

"You?"

"You're surprised? We were both kids before the internet existed; my parents had to do something to get me out of their hair, and it probably wasn’t different for you.”

Kurogane made a noncommittal noise that almost sounded like _I bet they did_, and Fai continued to massage. Moments passed, and he finally clarified. "It's just. It seems too normal for a wizard."

"Wizards can be normal!"

"Wizards can be normal?" Kurogane shot back, glancing back over his shoulders pointedly. Fai saw he was smirking, and he stuck his tongue out in response.

"Mean."

"Sorry."

He didn't look sorry. Fai stuck his tongue out again.

It turned out that Kurogane wasn't the type of person to make satisfied noises while they were getting a massage, and as much as Fai was disappointed to discover this, he couldn't spend much longer on Kurogane's back without his hands cramping.

"You're done.” Fai pronounced, "and I need to soak my hands."

Fai had been pulling away when Kurogane faced him, and caught one of Fai's wrists in midair. His fingers wrapped easily around Fai's hand, his hold loose, and his thumb fell into the dip of Fai's palm. His eyes searched Fai's, and a treacherous thought piped up from the back of Fai's mind. He's not doing this to check your eye colour.

"What?" Fai squeaked, once he had found his voice, because it really did look like Kurogane was on the cusp of saying- of saying _something_.

"Nothing," replied Kurogane, letting go of Fai's wrist. "Thanks."

"No problem. I'm uh," Fai gestured at the bathroom. "Gonna. Hands."

Fai wasn't technically fleeing, but he did almost break the water speed record for coward's retreat while crossing to the bathroom. He dunked his hands in cold water, and waited a long time for his pulse to slow down.


	4. The Lies

_Fifteen months ago._

It had been a few weeks since the party. Fai had been growing steadily more withdrawn, and while part of Kurogane was thrilled that his roommate was no longer putting so much effort into being excruciatingly annoying, mostly, Kurogane was… missing it. Which was weird.

Kurogane unlocked the door to their shared room. There was a dull ‘thunk’ after he had pushed it open an inch, after which it wouldn’t budge.

“Hey,” he called through the gap, “are you in there?”

There was rustling from inside.

“Open the door, idiot.” Kurogane said, feeling his irritation rising rapidly. The rustling grew closer, and there was the sound of a chair scraping across the floor. The door drifted a little, and Kurogane finished pushing it open. “What was that for?”

Fai had his back to him, replacing his chair at his desk. His shirt, usually kept so tidy, was rumpled, and his hair was sticking up in weird places. Fai cleared his throat.

“What do you mean?”

Kurogane rolled his eyes ceiling-ward. He was not in the mood to deal with Fai like this, especially if Fai didn’t want to be dealt with.

“Whatever,” he groused. He unshouldered his bag and threw it on his bed. “If you’re gonna do that can you at least give me a heads up so I can find somewhere else to sleep-”

Kurogane paused. Fai’s bed was unmade, and the bin next to it was overflowing with tissues. He had the horrible feeling he’d interrupted something, until he looked up and caught the look on Fai’s face. Fai’s grey eyes were red-rimmed, and though he had obviously taken care to fix his appearance, the tip of his nose was pink. He had been crying, had been trying to preserve his privacy, and Kurogane had just burst in and started reading him the riot act.

“What happened?” Kurogane asked. Fai wouldn’t meet his eyes, and shook his head once. The anger came back. “Can you not bullshit me, just this once?”

“Can’t you just leave it?”

“No!”

“Why not?”

“You’re crying, Fai! I’m supposed to see you upset and, and- and not care?”

Fai’s eyes finally slid up to meet his, and he frowned lightly, the corners of his mouth turning down. His eyes flicked back and forth between Kurogane’s, as if he was puzzling him out.

“You care?”

“That’s what I said, isn’t it?” Kurogane retorted, bristling. Maybe he had a funny way of showing it, but of _course_ he cared - he wasn’t a total dick. He had lived with Fai for months, and as much as the blonde was infuriatingly annoying, he also had a sense of humour like a whip, and was cleverer than Kurogane would have ever given him credit for. Fai continued to stare at him, blinking. He then finally averted his gaze, and shook his head.

“I can’t,” Fai said. He crossed his arms over his middle. “I won’t block the door again.”

Kurogane felt his shoulders drop as he deflated.

“Good,” he said lamely, not quite able to think of anything better. Weirdly enough, the one of them who would have been better in his shoes right now was Fai; Kurogane didn’t have a knack of knowing what to say to make someone feel better quite like he did. “Look, I, er… you don’t… have to tell me anything. If you don’t want to. I guess. It’s your business, right?”

Fai nodded shallowly. He had a faraway, unfocused look about him. Kurogane ploughed on.

“Do you want to get something to eat?”

“No, thanks.”

“It’s student’s night at the pub, we could-”

“I don’t really want to go out anywhere. Sorry.”

“That’s fine,” Kurogane replied, somewhat relieved. He wasn’t much of a going out person, anyway. “We’ll stay in and get takeaway. You can teach me to cheat at poker.”

That brought a ghost of a smile to Fai’s face. “I don’t cheat at poker.”

“Sure you don’t.”

“I don’t need to cheat at poker when you’re playing.”

Kurogane raised his eyebrows. Fai was looking at him again, with a bit of the old spark in his demeanour. “That’s an attack on my honour,” Kurogane declared. “I get to pick where we order from.”

“It’s not my fault you’re terrible at-”

“Keep digging, blondie, I’ll just add more pickles to your portion.”

Fai closed his mouth with a snap, but the sharp glint remained. “Fine. But if I puke because you order sushi again, it’ll be your fault.”

“Worth it.” Kurogane said. And it was - he didn’t order sushi that night, but in the end, he still got what he wanted. Whatever was bothering Fai didn’t seem to bother him for any longer.

“I want to tell you,” Fai said later, under the cover of darkness and their respective bedsheets. “There’s things about me, I just… it’s not a good idea.”

“You’re not in danger, right?” Kurogane replied, shifting to his side so that he could face Fai’s direction. “So don’t worry about it. It doesn’t matter if you’ve got bad stuff in your past - it’s who you are now that’s important.”

Much later, when the sunlight was starting to peek in through the curtains, Kurogane woke to a hand shaking his shoulder. Fai was sat beside him on the mattress, not looking like he had slept even a wink.

“Wh- Fai? What are you-”

“I’m a wizard, Kurogane.”

“You’re a what?” Kurogane spluttered. Fai smirked in a private joke, and reiterated what he had said. “You couldn’t think of a better prank? Jesus. What time is it?”

“Just before five,” Fai answered. “Come out with me; it’s wizarding hour.”

“Next time you barricade yourself in, I won’t even ask,” Kurogane grumbled, covering his head with his pillow. “I’ll just go straight to Souma’s and sleep on the couch.”

Fai shoved him again. “Come on, you’ve been asking me about magic for weeks - ‘and days and weeks’. I’m ready to talk, but we can’t do it here.”

“Why not?” Kurogane retorted, muffled by his pillow. “I’m fine for you to go back to blatant lying if it means I can stay in bed.”

“Well, the wizarding hour thing was a lie,” Fai admitted. “But I’m serious that I can’t show you while we’re here. The space is too enclosed.”

Kurogane lifted his pillow a fraction, just enough to glare at Fai from underneath it.

“You’re serious.”

“As a heart attack.”

In the end, Kurogane didn’t even agree to get up until Fai promised to buy him a triple-shot coffee. With the imminence of intense, blood-pumping caffeine just on the horizon, Kurogane dragged himself out of the warmth and comfort of the wickedly small bed and put the same clothes on from the day before, scrubbing a hand through his hair. Fai was already bright-eyed and ready to go, tapping away on his phone. It wasn’t until he asked Kurogane about caramel flavouring and foam that Kurogane realised he was ordering through an app. Thank God for 24-hour coffee chains.

It was about half an hour’s walk to wherever Fai was taking him. The coffee place had been a little detour on the way, and Kurogane nursed his cup like it would save his life. Fai took him to the city park, a microbiome of lush grass and thick trees interspersed with playing fields. By the time he turned to Kurogane and asked him to wait where he was - just a few paces into a secluded clearing - Kurogane was down to the dregs of his takeaway cup.

“Where are you going?” Kurogane asked, when Fai had taken a few steps away from him.

“I need some distance from you, before I show you my magic.”

“Right, sure,” Kurogane said mildly, “if I believe you - and I don’t, by the way - why do you need distance? Are you afraid you’ll… lose control, boil my blood in my veins, or something?”

“Gross,” Fai replied, cheerfully. “No, nothing like that. Being near you negates my magic, that’s all.” He finished, with a pat to the shoulder. By the time Kurogane had processed that new tidbit of information, Fai was already at least ten metres away.

When he had crossed to the middle of the clearing, Fai turned again to face Kurogane. Kurogane thought he could see Fai’s mouth moving, but he couldn’t hear the words. The wind started to pick up, and then Kurogane saw something that probably couldn’t be explained by science.

* * *

_Thirty-six hours after embarking._

Sleeping was awkward, that night. More so than it had been the night before, anyway, now that Fai was more used to the drain on his magic that occurred with extended proximity to his gruff roommate. Kurogane was a heavy weight, both on Fai's mind and on the other side of the bed, and Fai was struggling to settle properly. The massage had been a stupid, reckless idea, yet Fai couldn't really bring himself to really regret it. It had been nice, to touch Kurogane like a lover would, except without any of the ulterior expectations, and Kurogane had nearly gone and ruined it.

Fai had known immediately, deep in his core, what was lurking under the surface when Kurogane grabbed his hand. He had held his breath, full of adrenaline and excitement, and known that if Kurogane had said what was on his mind, Fai would have been utterly powerless to deny any reciprocation on his part.

It was probably for the best that nothing had happened, instead - except that was the part that Fai found himself regretting.

Fai rolled over, and studied Kurogane's silhouette in the dark. It would be so easy to just... reach for him. They were already on a boat crossing the ocean together, they were already fleeing from the law together, what was the use in being cautious now?

Except-

Except.

Kurogane's chest rose and fell evenly. Fai forced his breathing into its own rhythm, so that they were out of sync, in an act of petulant spite that only he would bear witness to.

It was no good. None of it.

Carefully, Fai extricated himself from the too-soft sheets and self-consciously straightened his clothes. Before Kurogane could catch him staring - which he had an odd knack for - Fai stole himself from the room, only just remembering to take the key with him.

The corridor was almost offensively bright, after the darkness of the cabin, but Fai didn't wait for his eyes to adjust. Half blind, he pointed himself towards where he remembered the stairwell to be, and let his feet carry him away. His lethargy, brought on by the drain in his magic, slowly ebbed as he put more distance between himself and Kurogane. The fog in his mind started clearing, and by the time he was out on the deck, breathing in the frigid night air, he felt almost like himself again. The worst of Kurogane’s negating power was always in actual physical contact with him, but even being in his presence was enough to make its effects felt.

Of course Fai had been right to flee, every single time. They were in enough trouble already, they didn't need to go and muddy everything with their feelings, even if they were evidently growing stronger every day. It would be better if Fai just escaped alone - stole a lifeboat, or something - anything to get away from the disaster of a relationship that lay before him. He would only drag Kurogane down, after all, and he would be much faster alone with the full force of his innate power as fuel.

Except, that wasn't right either.

Fai shook his head, hard. There were reasons that he and Kurogane had run away together - important reasons, reasons that were separate from his affection - yet the thought lingered.

What if he did just leave? What was stopping him? Not Kurogane, not really. If Fai really did care for Kurogane like he thought he did, then surely it would be safer for him to go off alone, and to take the fall alone when he was inevitably caught? Better that it was just one of them that was charged with conspiracy to perform witchcraft, and not the two of them, surely?

Except Fai didn't want to be alone.

…Did he?

Fai growled in frustration under his breath and rubbed the heels of his palms into his eyes. The fresh air was supposed to help clear his head, not twist it up further, and-

What was that?

Fai paused, hands an inch from his face, eyebrows drawn. He listened, and realised that it hadn't been a sound that had alerted him. He sniffed, and realised it hadn't been a scent. He reached out with his magic, and-

-

Fai awoke gasping and spluttering. His hand connected with something soft and fleshy, and his body jerked outside of his control.

"Wake up, Fai!"

Kurogane's face, red on the one side, was hovering above him. Actually, Kurogane's face wasn't the only thing that was hovering above him.

"We really need to discuss dinner, first," Fai croaked, the joke immediately falling flat. Kurogane's expression went from worried to severely exasperated, and he released Fai's wrists almost as if throwing them away. The kettle clicked, from the corner of the room, and Fai's bastard brain actually missed Kurogane's solid weight on his legs when he climbed off of Fai's body.

"What was that about?" Kurogane asked, and hastened to add, "Not that I would have cared if I hadn't been slapped."

"What was what about?" Fai shot back, grumbling as he pulled himself into a seated position. He ached all over, somehow, and the ends of his hair were damp, even though he wasn't sweating.

"You went sort of Exorcist on me."

Fai snorted dismissively, and said that it was good there weren't any Crucifixes around, but it was hard to cover up the fear in his gut. Why was his hair wet? Why was he wearing his shoes in bed? Had he been sleepwalking?

Something prodded at the back of his mind. Vaguely, and only vaguely, he remembered leaving the cabin the night before, having been irritated and agitated and unable to sleep it off.

"Why is the suitcase packed?"

Fai dragged his leaden head over to where Kurogane was stood beside the suitcase, which was stood upright and zipped up - two things it hadn't been since they'd embarked. "And why is it only your stuff that's in there?"

Oh, that was right. He was leaving.

Why was he doing that, again?

Kurogane was staring at him, and Fai realised that it had probably been a good few seconds since the question had been posed. He shrugged a shoulder, and rubbed at his aching head. He felt like he'd barely slept a wink, even if he had clearly been woken up from sleeping. He must've been tired to have not remembered even returning to the room after his walk. Kurogane was still staring at him. Fai flopped back onto the pillows.

"What activity should we do today?"

"Answer the question."

"I asked first."

"You- I-" Kurogane spluttered. "Where would you even go?!"

"I'm not going anywhere!" Fai replied, matching Kurogane for volume.

"Then why is the suitcase packed?"

"I don't know! I don't remember!"

Kurogane deflated, but only slightly. "You don't remember?"

Fai shook his head in the negative. "I think I must have... sleepwalked, or something."

"You don't sleepwalk."

Fai threw his hands up. He didn't know what had happened, but what other explanation was there for the gaping hole in his memory? He definitely hadn't been that tired when he had left the night before, he should be able to remember getting back into bed, even if he hadn't dried his hair or taken off his shoes or even done so much as to unbutton his jeans for comfort.

"Let's do salsa dancing this morning."

"You're not leaving me here, Fai."

"I know, okay, I know I'm not leaving you here," Fai sat back up again. Kurogane dutifully handed him a mug of bitter green tea, and he gulped down a mouthful, ignoring the sear of the hot water. "I can't remember packing the suitcase, alright? I'm telling you the truth."

Kurogane, at last, seemed to believe him. If only a little bit. The bed sagged under Kurogane's weight when he took a seat at the end, one of his hands on his knee, elbow up. For a moment, Fai allowed himself to sway on the spot, until he remembered they were at sea and the swaying wasn't coming from him. He settled back against the wall of the ship again.

"I have a weird feeling," he said, finally. He held his mug of tea between his two hands in his lap, and he was watching the steam curl up from within. His skin was prickling, and even though he finally remembered his plans from the previous night - his plans to run, alone, damn all the promises - he couldn't say he still felt the same. He inhaled, and confessed, "I went for a walk, last night. I couldn't sleep. I don't remember coming back."

Kurogane seemed to absorb those statements well. His intense expression didn't waver, and he continued to watch Fai. He always watched Fai.

"I'm not sure what it is," Fai went on to explain, when nothing was forthcoming from his accomplice. "As soon as I got out of range, something just... felt off. I wasn't thinking straight."

"And you planned to run."

It wasn't a question, and so Fai didn't answer. "I don't know what caused it. It was like... it was like my magic came back, and then some." He raised his eyes, finally, to meet Kurogane's. "I don't think I'm the only wizard on this ship."

That made Kurogane's stern expression lift.

"Are you sure?"

"Not entirely," Fai replied. He rubbed his face again, "But their aura is masked from me when I'm near you, so I'm guessing it's the same for them. We should be safe, still."

"You can't know that."

"Not for sure, but whoever it is hasn't approached us yet. They might even be in the same situation as we are."

Kurogane made a noncommittal noise, clearly still unconvinced. Fai wasn't even sure that he believed it himself, but what else could he do? "We should just act natural," he said. "They'll either reveal themselves to us eventually, or they won't."

Kurogane folded his arms across his chest. "I'm not going to any Salsa classes with you."


	5. The Love, Lost

_Fifteen months ago, cont._

The café was fairly quiet, given the early hour. They had just started serving breakfast, and opposite Kurogane, Fai was digging into a stack of pancakes that were practically drowning in golden syrup. Kurogane himself was nursing another cup of coffee, staring unseeing into its murky depths. Everything logical in his brain was assuring him that what he had just seen hadn’t been real - the mossy green phoenix that had burst from the earth at Fai’s command had just been an illusion, a trick of the light. Everything in his soul knew the truth of it, that Fai’s magic was just as real as Fai himself was. There had been absolutely no denying the blue glow in Fai’s eyes once the display was over. The blonde had walked back to Kurogane, and had stopped when he was a few metres away.

“Your eyes are blue,” Kurogane had said, dumbly. Fai had smiled, smug but not unkind, and stepped closer, until they were feet apart. All the while, the blue colour had faded away, leaving behind the icy grey colour that Kurogane was used to.

“Come on,” Fai had said. “I’m really hungry.”

And so there they were. They had gone to the first place that had been serving food, companionably silent the whole way. Kurogane thought he really should have an opinion on what he had just seen, but his brain would only get as far as ‘magic phoenix’, after which all coherence ended. So far, his opinion was that, as wild as it was, Fai had been telling the truth about his power. Anything beyond that… well, he needed more coffee.

Kurogane was knocked out of his thoughts by a squirting noise, and looked up to see Fai now coating his pancakes in a layer of squeezy raspberry jam.

“Do you want pancakes with the sugar?” he snarked, before he could stop himself.

“Careful, Kuro-pon,” Fai teased, “wouldn’t want me to boil your blood in your veins.”

“Shut up,” Kurogane retorted, rolling his eyes. Then, “can you actually do that?”

Fai, mouth full, shook his head with a grin. He swallowed thickly. “Not to you. You’re special.”

Kurogane scowled to cover up the leap his heart made. Good to know that unbridled fear hadn’t interfered with his annoying crush. “That doesn’t sound like a compliment.”

“It can be if you want it to be,” Fai said. “But I mean I literally can’t do magic on you; I wasn’t lying about the proximity thing.”

“You never actually explained that.”

“I know as much as you do, to be honest. I didn’t even know that kind of power existed.”

Kurogane sat back in his chair. Now he didn’t know what he should be more afraid of; the power that Fai seemed to be swimming in, or the opposite negating power that he himself apparently had.

“Can I summon stuff, too?”

“It’s not that kind of power,” Fai replied. He had demolished the pancakes, and was mopping up the rest of the jam and syrup with the tiny bit he had left. “It seems like it’s… more of a void, than a well, you know? Like a black hole.”

“Oh. Great.” Kurogane said sourly.

“I didn’t mean it like that,” Fai said. “I really don’t know how it works, I was kind of hoping you did.”

It turned out that that was why Fai had been so relentlessly weird about whether or not Kurogane believed in magic. Fai had felt the drain in his power as soon as they had first shaken hands, and had fled on pure instinct. He had even tried to switch rooms, it turned out, but he hadn’t been able to think up a good enough reason that wouldn’t get Kurogane arrested. He had returned warily, but when it turned out that Kurogane really didn’t have a clue about his ability, Fai had relaxed.

“It’s actually been useful,” Fai said, now stirring too many packets of sugar into his milky tea. “Magic’s illegal, and you’ve been hiding me better than I was doing by myself.”

“Magic is illegal? As in the government knows about it?”

“Yes, and no. And yes. It’s one of those ancient laws that they never bothered changing, and… it seems like they’ve started taking advantage of that.”

Kurogane held his head in his hands. They had officially crossed the line of ‘too much’. Fai must have taken pity on him, because he offered to settle the bill. While he was gone from the table (the café had some weird issue with the card reader, so Fai had to go and pay at the register), Kurogane’s phone rang.

“That took ages,” Fai remarked, as he sat back down at the table. He caught the look on Kurogane’s face. “What’s wrong?”

“My sister’s friend has been arrested.”

* * *

_Fifty-four hours after embarking._

It took some more talking, and some compromise, but they finally found something that they both might enjoy.

"I can't believe there's a cinema on a boat," Fai remarked as they found seats. Kurogane lead them towards the back of the audience area, and in a show of peacemaking from the earlier arguments, Fai chose not to make a lewd comment about it.

"Look, it's the people from yesterday," Kurogane said under his breath, once they were sat down. Wordlessly, they both started to sink lower in their chairs, Fai hiding behind the popcorn.

Not that it made that much of a difference; Harold and his wife were in the middle of a heated discussion, and didn't even look their way.

"I wonder what that's about," Fai remarked, watching over the rim of the popcorn. "They were so lovey-dovey, before…"

As they watched, though they couldn't hear what was being said, the woman's husband threw up his hands and stormed out of the screening. Fai and Kurogane exchanged mirrored looks - raised eyebrows, wide eyes. Fai shovelled a handful of popcorn into his mouth.

"So much for 'finding love'," Kurogane muttered, eliciting a short laugh from Fai, who then ducked further out of sight when nearby guests looked their way disapprovingly.

The film they were watching was some superhero flick that neither one of them really wanted to pay attention to. It was full of too-perfect men and too-perfect women, where the stakes were astronomical and the interpersonal relationships were stunted. Fai actually blew a raspberry during one particularly bad line delivery.

Just when Fai was considering taking a nap, Kurogane nudged his arm. Fai looked up at him quizzically, only partially illuminated in the light from the screen, and Kurogane gestured further down the row with a nod of his head.

Fai craned his neck to look around Kurogane. The cinema wasn't particularly full - it probably wasn't what a lot of people would come on a cruise for - but even if it had been packed it would have been obvious who he was indicating. The couple at the other end of the row were talking animatedly in rising tones, and it soon became apparent that they were also in the middle of a disagreement. It wasn’t just them, either - a group of four sat behind Kurogane and Fai had also started bickering in barely hushed voices.

"That's odd." Fai murmured, frowning.

"Yeah."

Almost as soon as they'd said it, another argument had broken out further down in the audience. This one was loud and disruptive, and it didn't take much for the rest of the guests to start getting involved. One of the people in the arguing couple nearest to them stood up abruptly and stomped down the aisle towards the exit, their partner in tow. Fai watched them with curiosity, and Kurogane nudged him again.

"Let's go."

"You want to get involved in that?"

"It'd be more fun that watching any more of this."

"Your sense of humour is unbelievable."

"Sure," Kurogane agreed. "Bring the popcorn."

The couple hadn't gotten far, and by some stroke of luck, didn't notice Kurogane and Fai blatantly following them. The argument didn’t seem to be about anything in particular, though, so they gave up eavesdropping almost as soon as they left the cinema, and let the couple escape.

“You don’t see that every day,” Fai commented. “The film was awful, though.”

“Mmm,” Kurogane hummed in agreement. “Think it’s the work of that other wizard?”

Fai raised a shaped eyebrow at Kurogane. “Because wizards have nothing better to do than mess with muggles?”

“_Muggles,” _Kurogane repeated. “Really?”

“No, of course not. I don’t think that was because of the other wizard, besides.”

“You’re weirdly calm about it.”

Fai looked up at Kurogane, who was regarding him evenly. “How so?”

“Another wizard being here puts us in more danger.”

“I don’t think we have anything to worry about,” Fai said, throwing popcorn over the side of the railing as if he was feeding the ducks at the park. “If they reveal themselves, we’ll be on even footing. They don’t know about your power, after all.”

“Yeah, but,” Kurogane muttered, “neither do we. We don’t know if there’s some kind of limit, or-“

“There’s not a limit to it.”

“And you know this... how, exactly?”

Fai shrugged.

“Fine, don't answer. It's not like we have anything to worry about. Where did you go last night, again?”

Fai paused, his arm half extended in another arcing throw.He frowned, and threw the popcorn after a moment’s deliberation. “Point taken.”

Later, when they were relaxing out on the deck in the sun, Fai piped up, pushing his sunglasses up into his hair.

“Still,” he started, as if there hadn’t been any lull in conversation, “they could’ve attacked me easily last night; they had the element of surprise. Now they don’t even have that.”

Kurogane looked up from the manga he was reading. Fai had no idea where he could have gotten it from, and probably would have affectionately called him a nerd if they weren't already talking about something more pressing. “Is that normal? You sense another wizard and just attack?”

“I... wouldn’t know.”

Kurogane raised his eyebrows. “You wouldn’t know?” He repeated. Fai shrugged. “You’ve never met another wizard?”

“Not in so many words,” Fai hedged, lowering his sunglasses back over his eyes. There were things that he still really didn’t want Kurogane knowing, regardless of their situation. Things that Fai wanted to keep close and undisturbed. “It doesn’t affect us now, so. I don’t think the wizard will attack. End of conversation.”

He didn’t for a second think that it would be enough to dissuade Kurogane’s insatiable curiosity, but surprisingly, nothing more was said on the subject. Kurogane must have noticed how much of a touchy topic it was for Fai, and was actually respecting his wishes for once. Fai didn’t want to admit how much that unnerved him.

Luckily, he was saved from anything else being said by the arrival of their drinks.

"Sorry for the wait, gents," the waiter apologised. "Bit of commotion at the bar."

"Is everything alright?" Fai asked, before he could really stop himself.

"Nothing that can't be sorted with a mop."

Fai picked up his glass - he didn’t remember exactly what he had ordered, other than it was fruity and had two paper umbrellas sticking out of it. He sipped loudly through the straw, casting his eyes to the side to see Kurogane’s reaction, and instead caught sight of a couple as they stormed past, speaking in angry hushed tones, one of them wet down the front of their torso. The waiter shook his head in the direction of the couple, and managed to turn his smile back on before addressing Fai again to ask if there was anything else he needed.

"Isn't it odd?" Fai said, instead, "I don't think I've ever seen so many couples suddenly start to argue with one another."

"I wouldn't pay them any mind," the waiter replied, "they'll be right as rain once we get to shore. They usually are."

Once the waiter had departed, Fai twisted on his plastic chaise to talk to Kurogane, finding him already looking over the top of his manga at him.

"'They usually are'?" Kurogane echoed.

"I mean... it could be the cabin fever?" Fai suggested. "Literally."

"Or," Kurogane countered, doggedly, "it could be the other wizard."

Immediately, Fai began to argue with him. It was starting to get annoying, that Kurogane would look at every bad or strange occurrence and suddenly it was the fault of the other wizard - the other wizard that they weren't even sure existed. There was a reason that wizards were so successful at staying hidden, and it was that the majority of them were innate hermits and hardly ever did anything that would draw attention to themselves. He told Kurogane as such, punctuated by loud sips through the straw of his fruity cocktail. Kurogane twitched every time the straw rasped, and Fai tried not to feel too smug about it.

"And besides," Fai continued, lowering his voice and leaning closer, which Kurogane mirrored, "the way he said it, it's not the first time this has happened. Why would a wizard hang out on a cruise ship if they were on the run, like we are?"

"So what you're saying," Kurogane said slowly, his volume matching Fai's, "is that there's something weird going on. We don't know if it's magic, but it's causing the passengers of this ship to argue for no reason, and it has happened more than once. Enough to be a pattern."  
Fai nodded vigorously. Kurogane kept speaking.

"If it is magic, and it isn't being masked, then we're in danger."

"Right," Fai said, "and if it's not magic, then we're fine."

"So we need to find out if it's magic or not."

"Right."

"So we need to find the other wizard."

"Righ--- wait, _no-"_

Kurogane sat back in his own chaise, a self-satisfied look on his face, while Fai spluttered indignantly.

"You just said it yourself; we could be in danger. I'd rather know what we're up against, instead of debating -" Kurogane threw a hand up in the air in a flippant gesture as he spoke "- Schrödinger's Wizard."

Scowling, Fai slumped back on his chaise.

"I don't know what annoys me more," he said after a moment, witheringly, "the fact that you're right, or the terrible philosophy joke."


	6. The Spark

_Fifteen months ago, cont. ii._

Kurogane rushed around their shared room, shoving things into the rucksack he had brought with him on move-in day, all those months ago.

"What are you doing?"

Fai had appeared in the doorway, looking bewildered. Kurogane hadn't slept, and sort of dreaded how he looked in that moment - his hair must have been a mess, his eyes wild. He had to look bad, for Fai to look so concerned for him.

But they didn't have time for that.

"Good, you're back. I think I have enough clothes for you, but you should double-check."

"Are we going somewhere?" Fai asked lightly. Kurogane knew him well enough by now to see right through the feeble humour.

"They took that girl right off the street in front of us." Kurogane said. Fai hurriedly shut the bedroom door behind him, shooting him an irritated look which Kurogane brushed off. "They took my sister's best friend, and they won't say why. How long before they come for you?"

"You don't need to worry. It's handled."

"Is it?" he challenged. Fai's grey eyes met his in defiance.

"I'm rooming with someone who negates my magic perfectly," he said. "I won't be flagging up on any radars, or anything like that. I'm safe here."

"And what happens if they already have your name, or your face, in some file somewhere?" Kurogane said. "If I'm with you, you can't be detected. But if you stay here, they will find you. We need to leave."

Fai shook his head, and cast his eyes down.

"I won't ask you to do that."

"Good, because I'm offering," Kurogane zipped the bag shut forcibly. "I'm _insisting._"

Sharply, Fai looked up again.

"Why?" he asked. Kurogane held his gaze, his pulse rushing in his ears. Fai was staring at him, trying to figure him out, when abruptly the crease between his eyebrows smoothed out.

Fai nodded.

"Okay."

* * *

_Fifty-four hours after embarking, cont._

As it turned out, finding the other wizard was harder than they expected it to be. To start with, Fai dithered his very best over the whole thing, insisting that he needed to have lunch before he could concentrate. Then he needed a shower, and a change of clothes, and a nap. Finally, Kurogane hid all of the sweets Fai had squirrelled away in their luggage, and threatened to throw them overboard if the blonde didn’t knuckle down.

Even with Fai actually putting the effort in, the search wasn’t particularly fruitful. They had to keep at a particular distance from each other for Fai to even be able to detect other magic, but if they were too far apart, the influence of the wizard addled Fai’s mind. Perfectly toeing the two invisible lines was no small task, and they had to move around the boat as if they were tied together with string. Fai suggested using actual string at one point, but Kurogane shot it down almost immediately, inexplicably preferring to follow Fai at a precise distance. It wasn’t until Fai was using Kurogane’s intense concentration against him, somehow managing to fool Kurogane into walking right into railings and walls and other people, that Kurogane finally agreed. If he was embarrassed at what they must look like, him with Fai on a leash made of twine, and Fai bounding around and weaving through the crowds of other passengers like an excited Golden Retriever, he didn’t say anything about it.

“I don’t know why I’m finding it so hard to get an accurate fix on the source,” Fai said, the day after they first started actually _searching_. They had taken a break at one of the coffee stands on board the ship, and Fai was trying to talk and stop his ice cream from dripping onto his hand at the same time. “I thought that it’d be plain sailing, like following a cable back to the socket, but instead it’s like… trying to figure out where sheet lightning starts from. Like it fills the whole sky."

“So it’s happening in flashes?”

Fai made a face. “Sorry, that was my fault. Bad analogy. It’s like…” he paused briefly, to lick a line up the side of his cone where a brook of melted ice cream was running straight for him. “It’s like trying to figure out where the ocean starts. Or a very still lake. I can feel it in the air, but not in any sort of directional sense.”

Fai looked up to see Kurogane giving the cone in his hand a thousand-yard stare. Fai frowned. “Are you even listening to me?”

Kurogane looked away as if shocked. “If you can’t sense where it’s coming from, how will we find the source?”

“I’m working on it.” Fai said, with more confidence than he was actually experiencing at that moment. “If I keep my metaphorical eyes peeled, I should be able to eventually spot where the flow is coming from. It’s just a case of staying precisely five feet apart,” he eyed the small gap between himself and Kurogane, where they were sat with their chairs practically on top of one another. “We’re already failing step one.”

“I needed a break from people thinking I was taking you for a walk.” Kurogane grumbled, staring resolutely at his coffee. Fai took this as his cue to make some flirtatious joke about being tied up, which Kurogane took as a cue to tip Fai out of his chair.

They didn’t find anything for the rest of the day, and Fai followed Kurogane around one of the higher decks, feeling dejected. He hadn’t had as much trouble with anything in his life, and he couldn’t understand why or how this one wizard - he was sure it was a wizard - was eluding him so thoroughly. He stopped, the sudden jerk on the twine that bound them causing Kurogane to glance back at him. Fai stared into the middle distance, mouth turned down at the corners. Honestly, now would have been a good time to sink into a sulk, if that had been something he was prone to doing.

“This isn’t exactly working, Kuro-rin,” he said, instead, when a thought came to mind.

Maybe he was going about it all the wrong way.

Kurogane opened his mouth and looked like he was about to say something, when he was pushed aside by a stranger. Next to him, the stranger embraced another person, smashing her mouth against theirs. Kurogane took a step away in shock - not that Fai could really blame him for it; it looked like they were trying to _devour_ each other.

“I made them feel sexy,” Fai said, hollowly. Kurogane had good hearing, and even keeping his distance, he would be able to hear Fai perfectly.

“You can- you can do that?” asked Kurogane, a strange arch to his voice. “Make them feel sexy?"

“I don’t like to.” Fai said simply, and left it at that. They were staring somewhat voyeuristically at the couple, but they weren’t the only ones. Such a hot and heavy lip-lock wasn’t a common sight usually, regardless of whether or not they were on a ship that made people quarrel. As abruptly as it had started, it stopped, one woman shoving away the other with a string of expletives, and Fai whipped his head around.

_A spark._

_There._

He started off in the direction of the spark he had felt, dragging Kurogane along. It had been a quick, fleeting thing, but Fai was latched on like a hook being reeled in. Its source hadn’t been far away, and navigating the corridors and _Staff Only_ rooms in order to get there without being caught took time, but neither of them slowed their pursuit. Finally, after they’d turned so many corners that Fai worried absently about their ability to find their way back out again, they came to a set of double doors. They looked fairly grand, made of wood varnished to a dark shine, a nameplate fixed into place across the top of the frame.

“The captain’s the one responsible for all of this?”  
Fai hummed noncommittally. He couldn’t feel anything on the other side of the door, but with Kurogane’s sudden proximity, it was hard to feel much with his magical senses at all. He pushed open the door.

“Oh,” he said, upon seeing the creature lounging in the captain’s chair with their pudgy foot in their mouth. “Well, that doesn’t make sense.”

“It’s a baby.” Kurogane said, deadpan and unimpressed. “You found a baby.”

They certainly looked like a baby. They had soft, unblemished skin, and their hair framed their face in a halo of curls. They watched Kurogane and Fai curiously, blue eyes flicking between them. Then, four more blue eyes opened, and a pair of pure white wings unfurled from their back.

“They’re a cupid.”

Kurogane was gaping at the cupid, his eyes wide as saucers.

“Cupid? Like, arrows made of love cupid?”

“Sort of, but much less… Christian.” Fai inhaled shakily. “It’s why every couple on this ship has been fighting. It _feeds_ on love, and leaves hatred in its place.”

“That’s barbaric.”

The cupid’s eyes - all six of them - drifted and settled on Fai, their irises pure white and shining. The hairs on Fai’s arms stood on end, electrified. Inwardly, he reached for his magic, and came up grasping nothing. The string binding him with Kurogane was too loose.

The cupid struck, and all of the air rushed from Fai’s lungs. He was tackled to the ground just in time to miss being vaporised, and was being unceremoniously yanked back up to his feet before he had even had the chance to catch his breath. Wheezing and clutching Kurogane’s arm, he stared calculatingly at the cupid.

As the cupid was a creature of magical origin, and as Fai was just a human with some magical talent, he felt overwhelmingly like he’d brought a knife to a gun fight. Worse, even - like the knife was a spoon, and the gun was a rocket launcher. The cupid could eviscerate him without too much thought on their behalf, and part of Fai was wondering why that hadn’t happened already.

“That blast,” Kurogane growled into his ear, and Fai nodded, knowing the end of the statement before it needed to be said. The cupid had the power to raze the entire ship to the ground - or to sea-level - and they’d probably already pinged up on all of the nearest magical radars. They had probably less than an hour before the Authorities descended upon them, and when that happened…

Fai shoved Kurogane back through the wooden doors. He may only have a spoon, but it was still enough to break string, and the one binding them together fell limp to the floor.

“Get away,” he warned, “I’ll do what I can here, just. Make sure you get away.”

Kurogane scoffed at him, but whatever his reply would have been was cut off when Fai shut the door. The cupid almost seemed to bristle in anger, its curly hair standing on end. Fai felt his magic return to him in drips, and then a flow, and a rush as he walked away from the doors, his fear ebbing as it did so. He would save the ship, at the very least, even if it burned the magic right out of his blood-

The cupid began to shoot at him, a lightning-fast volley of energy, each little ball coming hot on the trail of the one before it. Fai deflected and dodged to the best of his ability. Each ball disappeared before striking the walls of the cabin only to be remade by the enraged cupid. Before long, sweat started to roll down Fai’s skin, his wispy fringe plastered to his forehead. He gasped for breath, reaching his limit far sooner than he could have anticipated. He backed away, the Cupid’s attack coming just as relentless as it had started.

His shoulders hit something solid behind him - the wall. He reached inwardly for his magic and found none there, closed his eyes against the incoming attack -

And nothing happened.

All sound in the room ceased, except for Fai’s harsh breathing. The electric noise of the cupid’s magic was sapped from the air as suddenly as it had started.

Whatever Fai expected to see when he opened his eyes, Kurogane stood there awkwardly holding the cupid was still a surprise. Kurogane had it held under the armpits and away from his body, and the cupid suddenly looked like a normal baby. Two eyes, two arms, two legs, and no wings.

Fai swallowed hard, and nodded once at Kurogane.

“Good idea,” he rasped.

Kurogane flinched and stared at the baby. “I think it’s talking to me.”

“Oh,” Fai said. “Makes sense. They’re low-level telepathic.”

“You couldn’t have mentioned that sooner?” Kurogane groused, before addressing the cupid directly. “Why do you sound like Ryan Reynolds?”

“What’re they saying?”  
Kurogane shook his head. “It’s trying to bargain with me,” then, at the baby again “it’s not happening.”

“Alright, well,” Fai tried to gather his thoughts and found them entirely uncooperative. He honestly didn’t even expect that he still would have been alive long enough to talk to the Cupid, let alone interrogate them. “Why didn’t you kill me?”  
The baby’s unimpressed scowl deepened.

“It says it didn’t have the power.” Kurogane answered. “‘The supply wasn’t adequate’ - what does that mean?”

“The love,” Fai murmured, “this is a couples’ cruise, they probably expected it to be full of couples in love.”

“It was,” Kurogane said, giving voice to what the cupid seemed to be saying to him. “At first. But recently it’s been different.”

“So why not leave?” Fai asked, and then, answering his own question, “because you didn’t have enough power to even teleport yourself.”

“Fai,” Kurogane said, interrupting Fai’s train of thought. Fai followed Kurogane’s line of sight and a heavy weight settled into his stomach. “We need to get out of here.”

Through the window, Helicopters were circling them in the sky.

The Authorities had arrived.


	7. The Love, II

_Seventy-three and a half hours after embarking._

“What’s our plan?” Fai asked.

They had hurried back through the ship to the only other place they could agree on - their cabin - and he had just thrown the deadbolt on over the latch. Kurogane, still holding the powerless cupid, gaped at him.

“I thought you had a plan!”

“I was following you!”

The cupid put a hand to their eyes. Kurogane stared murderously at Fai, who started to pace and wring his hands.

“Okay, well, we should probably hide. The cupid is… _in hand. _Are you still shielding my magic, too?”

“Your eyes are grey.”

Okay, that was good, at least. Without the magical energy signature to follow, they might just assume that Fai had teleported himself away - they still didn’t know about Kurogane’s ability. The three of them could hide below decks, in the storage or something, until the Authorities left again.

“That isn’t going to work,” Kurogane said immediately, when Fai relayed his idea, “they’ll do head counts, and then they’ll pull this boat apart plank by plank.”

Fai sighed heavily. Kurogane was right, and if they were doing head counts as was entirely likely, just keeping close enough to Kurogane to keep his magic hidden wouldn’t be enough.

“I wonder how hard it’d be to add a baby to our bill,” Fai murmured.

Kurogane snorted. “We’re paying for this?”

The cupid stared right back at him levelly. He sighed, and looked up at Kurogane.

“I’m out of ideas,” he admitted quietly, with a defeated shrug. Kurogane’s eyebrows pulled together, and he looked instead at the cupid.

“Not a good time to start being speechless, blondie.”

Fai laughed shortly, bitterly. They watched the cupid, who looked calculatingly between the two of them, and settled its piercing eyes on Kurogane.

“I’ll tell them I bewitched you,” Fai said, his voice wavering. “I don’t know what you’ll do with the cupid, but. You won’t be implicated because of me.”  
“You can do that?” Kurogane asked solemnly, a mere echo of the previous time he had posed Fai the same question. “Bewitch me?”

Fai inhaled, and smiled cautiously. “Not a good time to start flirting, Kuro-wan.”

Unable to help himself, he reached up, and placed his hand against Kurogane’s shoulder. He was warm, and strong - as he had always been, as Fai had always imagined he would be. The hand that Kurogane didn’t have wrapped around the cupid reached up, and curled softly around Fai’s.

“You’re not handing yourself in.”

“There’s no other choice, here.” Fai argued, “I don’t have enough power to teleport, I used it all in the fight. And even if I did, I’m not leaving you.”

“Of the two of us, I’ll be safer. I’m literally the opposite of what they’re looking for.” Kurogane replied. “I’ll tell them you bewitched me, fine - but I won’t do it so that they can put you in chains.”

Fai huffed with wry exasperation. “Well, I guess we’re at an impasse.”

From behind the closed door, down the hallway, they heard pounding fists and raised voices. The easygoing ambience of the ship had changed entirely during their conversation, and Fai heard people shouting and panicking. The Authorities had not come aboard quietly.

“We don’t have time for an impasse.” Kurogane growled, pressing the cupid into Fai’s arms.

“What are you doing?” He all but shrieked.

“What needs to be done.”

Kurogane kissed him then, hard, backing the three of them away from the door. Fai felt his hand get pried away from its vicelike grip on Kurogane’s shirt, and as soon as the kiss had started, it was over. Fai and the cupid were pushed further away.

The last thing Fai saw, before the light enveloped him, was the door of their cabin bursting open, and Kurogane being shoved onto his knees.

And then they were gone.

* * *

The train rattled along its tracks, screaming through the tunnels. The people clustered inside - lucky enough to have caught the train before rush hour began in earnest, but not lucky enough to miss the afternoon downpour - ignored each other habitually, each of them with their noses buried in newspapers, or their phones, or staring out of the dark windows. As it was, nobody noticed when a thin blonde man holding a baby winked into existence in between them. Those that did notice just assumed that the two had been on the carriage the entire time.

They did notice, however, when the blonde man shrieked.

Fai had never been a huge fan of teleporting. It felt wrong, like putting your shoes on backwards, and he always experienced momentary confusion after reappearing at the other end, even if he had been the one to orchestrate the jump. As someone who had merely been taken along for the ride, it was much less pleasant.

And now, people were staring at him. He stood out anyway, being the only person in the carriage with dry clothes and no umbrella, and the baby in his arms that was rolling their eyes.

“S-sorry,” he stammered, pulling his phone out and waving it a little. “I have to take this.”

Most of the other passengers looked away, the ones that didn’t still eyeing him warily. He swallowed and tried to steady his voice.

“Where are w- you?” He said into the phone, staring the cupid in the eyes.

‘_Safe’_ the cupid answered, in his mind. It was almost as unpleasant as the teleporting had been.

“I didn’t think you had enough… _fuel_.”

_'Your friend was willing to provide.’_ The cupid sniffed. ‘_And you, using a Void being as some sort of cloaking device. You ought to feel ashamed.’_

“We need to go back,” Fai replied shortly, ignoring the jab. “Now.”

_‘I’d rather not.’_

“It wasn’t a request.”

_‘And what will you do to enforce your orders, wizard? You have about as much power as a tea light, and your friend isn’t here to protect you.’_

Fai looked away in frustration. The cupid was right, he was still drained from their short confrontation, and he could feel the cupid’s own energy crackling under his skin. Even if Fai did have enough power, there was no way he could use it without the Authorities swarming him like ants to a carcass. He lowered his voice further.

“You need to act more like a baby. People are staring.”

_‘They’re staring because your phone shouldn’t work underground.’_ The cupid retorted. _‘Even _**I** _know that. I thought wizards were supposed to be clever, your friend was much quicker on the uptake.’_

“I prefer to keep my thoughts to myself, thanks.”

_‘Of course you do,’_ the cupid replied flatly, and started to squirm. _‘Alight at the next stop, wizard.'_

Almost as soon as they had said it, the train began to slow, its brakes creating a deafening squeal. Fai chose not to argue and joined the crowd of people also getting off of the train, taking himself and the cupid out of the station entirely. He had no ticket or travel card, but the barriers let him pass all the same, and he pinched an umbrella from where it was leaning, sodden and abandoned, against a wall.

Outside, the air was wet, the rain coming down in freezing sheets, and Fai unthinkingly tucked the mostly naked cupid into his hoodie. One of the spokes of the umbrella was broken, sticking out at a strange angle, but the rest were enough to shield them both from the rain.

“Why won’t you take me back?” Fai asked, when they were engulfed in the crowds, and his voice was drowned out to all but the cupid cradled close to his body.

_‘I gave your friend my word that you would be spirited away from the danger.’_

“You said he was ‘willing to provide’.”

_‘That was the bargain. His love, for your safety.’_

Fai felt the hair on his arms and the back of his neck stand on end, and it had nothing to do with the frigid weather.

“Do you know who those people were?” He asked instead. “The ones that stormed the boat.”

_‘I am not concerned with human affairs,’_ the cupid replied loftily, completely at odds with the way they were presently sticking their thumb into their mouth.

“Their official stance is to round up wizards,” Fai continued, again choosing to ignore the cupid’s reply. Rooming with Kurogane over the last year had tempered his skill at persistence in the face of nonchalance. Or, more usually, annoyance. “Except, being non-magical humans, with non-magical technology, they can’t tell the difference between wizards and any other magical being. They’re kidnapping and imprisoning _everyone_ who isn’t completely human.”

That seemed to give the cupid pause. As they mulled over what Fai had told them, Fai bought himself a hot chocolate from a street vendor. It was difficult to juggle the cupid, the umbrella, and the drink, but the added warmth was worth it, especially when he managed to secure himself a seat on a mostly dry bench. Steam curled up through the spout of the travel cup, and Fai blew on it before taking a mouthful.

_‘Humans do such odd things for love,’_ the cupid mused. Fai glanced up, and followed their line of sight. Across the street, two people were sharing a newspaper, holding it over their heads to shield from the rain even as it turned to mulch in their hands. They were laughing. Fai swallowed the hot chocolate past the lump in his throat.

“Kurogane struck a deal to send me away,” Fai replied slowly. “What if I ask to do the opposite, with my-“ he couldn’t say it. Not even to the cupid. “-with my _fuel_.”

The cupid scowled. _‘I do not grant wishes, I am not a genie. I bargained with your friend for my own means.’_

“You won’t help me save him,” Fai surmised, “even if it’s the right thing to do.”

_‘Right and wrong is for the concern of humans and angels.’ _The cupid responded. _‘I have no desire to place myself back upon that forsaken vessel, much less so into immediate danger, when it can be so simply avoided.’_

Fai watched the crowds blankly from where he sat, the cup in his hand growing cold, the rain hammering against the web of the umbrella. Who knew how much time had passed already, where Kurogane would be by now. Had the Authorities left him safely on the cruise ship, unable to find the one they had truly been hunting? Had they taken him with them as a prisoner, for aiding and abetting? Would Fai even be able to find Kurogane, now, even if he had had the means to do so?

The cupid shifted in his lap.

_‘Humans do such odd things,’ _the cupid repeated, and then they sighed. _‘I will not assist you in your endeavour, but… I may know a person who will._

_'It will not be easy, you know,' _the cupid added. _'Getting him back.'_

The rain grew heavier. Fai's lips thinned. He stood, tossing his takeaway cup into the bin, and disappeared into the crowds.


	8. The Epilogue

_One day since he left Kurogane behind._

The note in his hand was crumpled, the letters smudged by the rain. The names and addresses on it were almost illegible, but it didn’t stop them from echoing around his head anyway.

This had been the last parting gift from the cupid. Teleportation had been out of the question - Fai had slept rough the night before, and had used an impressive amount of magic on just staying warm and dry - and now he found himself prowling up the cross country train in search of an open seat. His mind and body and heart all ached as one. All he had left was his determination, and luckily, he found it to be unending.

* * *

_One month since he left Kurogane behind._

Finding the cupid’s contacts was proving to be much more trouble than it was worth.

Never mind that he was constantly having to look over his shoulder, now that Kurogane wasn’t around with his built-in magic dampener to keep him safe. Fai had decided quickly to just use his magic in small amounts, in small actions that were done within the blink of an eye, so that it would be hard to track him. He was carrying cash, stolen from a magically confused cash point, and had used it to buy all of his train tickets so far. He covered his tracks as efficiently as he could manage, taking looping, crisscrossing routes between each spell and leaving hints of magic here and there. Anything that could confuse any would-be pursuers.

The list the cupid had given him was mulch in his coat pocket by now, but the addresses were seared into his brain. All the other visits had been dead ends, the residences either abandoned or occupied by people who had no idea who he was searching for. He was at his last stop.

It was a small building, and it looked like it was in an excellent state of repair considering its age. It was squashed between two much taller, more modern buildings, and it was so dinky that Fai easily could have missed it.  
If it wasn’t for the strong aura of magic that surrounded it, that is.

As soon as he raised his hand to knock, the door opened. The woman behind it smiled at him, and he asked the question he somehow already knew the answer to.

“Are you the witch of dimensions?”

* * *

_One year since he left Kurogane behind._

Yuuko Ichihara had proven to be a formidable woman, with more connections than a wireless router. Fai hadn’t been sure at first of her title - he was sure ‘witch of dimensions’ was just a display of arrogance, and though he hadn’t seen any trans-dimensional magic during the short visits he made to her, he could never quite shake the feeling that she knew far more than she was letting on.

Regardless, she had quickly pointed him in the right direction, and had put him in touch with the largest magical resistance in the country. This name _was_ more grand than it let on - there were only about twenty or thirty of them, altogether and Fai included, but the number was beginning to grow as more and more ‘unexplained’ raids started to happen and gain national attention. The magical nature of the people being imprisoned was still not widely known, but Syaoran - one of the young men in the resistance - speculated often that it wouldn’t be long before the cat was out of the bag.

Through the resistance, Fai got a large chunk of magical training under his belt. His power was much sharper now, more refined. It could only help him make his case.

“Let me get this completely straight,” Touya said from the head of the table. Maps and charts were strewn across the surface - Fai’s handiwork, a project that had become an obsession. “You want to storm their stronghold - the most heavily guarded anti-magic fortress on the continent - to rescue one person?”

The other people in the room looked between themselves. Fai caught them smirking from the corners of his eyes, and he fought to keep his frustration in check.

“He’s not just a random _person_,” Fai argued. “He has the power to cancel out magic - regardless of how powerful the magic user is. He negated the power of a cupid, just by holding it. He’s the reason I managed to stay hidden for so long - without him, they would have found me in weeks, or days, even, but it was months before they caught us.”

“Oh, I see,” Touya said lightly, and Fai started to brighten with hope. “You want to storm the stronghold to rescue your boyfriend.”

Someone across the room scoffed.

“Well,” Fai hesitated briefly, and shrugged. “Yeah.”

Touya studied him for a minute, and gave a nod.

“Alright then.”

* * *

_One year, eight months, two weeks and five days since he left Kurogane behind._

Storming the stronghold went smoother than Touya had anticipated it would. Fai supposed it was Touya’s job to predict every outcome of the infiltration attempt they had spent the last eight months planning, and it had paid off. Privately, he was almost worried that it had paid off _too _well, but he wasn’t about to look a gift horse in the mouth.

Fai had been part of the initial attack, given his natural aptitude for sneaking. His heart had pounded fiercely the whole time, and it was not entirely due to the fighting.

For the past year, Fai had been keeping an eye on this part of the map, both electronically and magically. There was a spot where there was a total absence of magic, right in the middle of one of the strongest gatherings of magic that he had ever felt.

Kurogane was _here_.

Somewhere.

Part of him was dreading actually finding his friend. Fai dreaded to see what the last twenty months had made of him, had been imagining the worst ever since their first night apart, all of it made worse by constant nightmares.

He had had dreams where Kurogane was starved and thin, the bones visible through his skin and his eyes sunken into his head. He had had dreams where Kurogane was enraged at the sight of him, had shouted until his voice was raw, had demanded to know why Fai hadn’t come back for him sooner, had demanded to know how Fai could have just left him there. He had had dreams that had been pleasant memories of their time together at university, before the Authorities had started to snatch people off of the streets. He had had dreams where their small, fragile romance had blossomed and grown strong, and the bliss he felt in his dreams came crashing down around him as soon as he woke up in the morning, the other side of the bed cold and empty.

He had had dreams where Kurogane didn’t recognise him at all.

Those were by far the worst.

Fai pushed his thoughts away and stole quietly down the corridor, mentally mapping as he went. It didn’t matter what Kurogane would be like. Regardless of the state Kurogane would be in, Fai was not going to leave him behind again.

When he did finally find him, locked in a surprisingly comfortable-looking cell, and only a little bit thinner than Fai remembered, his mouth fell open in shock.

“Took you long enough,” Kurogane groused, an almost unbelievably easy look in his eyes. There was no bite to his words, and Fai rushed forward, folding him into his arms. Kurogane held him tight - there was definitely some loss of muscle, but it wasn’t that surprising - and breathed him in. He was so warm, and so solid, and so _real_, and so, _so _much better than a dream.

“Sorry,” Fai choked, grinning ear-to-ear. “My train was delayed.”

From there, kissing him was easy, and so much more satisfying than the rushed kiss on the cruise ship.

Fai pulled back, taking all of Kurogane in. His vision blurred, and he swallowed hard against the lump in his throat.

“I’m- so glad, you’re-“

A crash reverberated down from a floor above them, cutting off what Fai was saying. Wide-eyed, he blinked. “Uh oh. We need to get moving.”

“I hope that wasn’t our ride,” Kurogane muttered.

“I believe that was our distraction.” Fai replied after a moment, offering his hand. “You want to get out of here?”

“On one condition,” Kurogane said. Fai looked at him quizzically, and Kurogane smirked. “No more couples’ cruises.”

Fai laughed in a way that he hadn’t done for almost two years.

“Done.”

_Fin_

**Author's Note:**

> I'm just.. really glad I finished it;;;;
> 
> Please head on over to [Dreamwidth](https://kurofai.dreamwidth.org) to score this fic as well as all the other fantastic entries to this year's Olympics :)


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